Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) |

Introduction

The Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) utility is designed to update Nitrux OS and provide a backup option for rollbacks.

⚠️ Important: The Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) is intended to work exclusively in Nitrux OS, and using this utility in other distributions will break them or not work at all. Please do not open issues regarding this use case; they will be closed.

Overview

The Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) is a simple, minimalistic system update and rollback utility. It performs three steps:

1. It creates a backup of the root directory using SquashFS and the XFS partition using the XFS tools and stores them locally.
2. Then, it downloads an OTA-style update file and updates the system using a custom AppImage.
3. Depending on the situation, the utility uses 'rsync' and the locally generated SquashFS file or the XFS tools when restoring a backup.

♦ Information: The Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) is included by default, starting with Nitrux 2.9.0.

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What nuts is

• Minimalistic, focusing on necessary functionality.
• A CLI utility.
• 100% Free and Open Source Software written entirely in POSIX-compliant scripting language.

What nuts is not

• A package manager.
  • nuts does not interact with any software "repository".
  • nuts does not manage packages directly. It has no "knowledge" about filesystem contents, cache, etc.
• An installer.
  • nuts is inspired by the functional workflow of most Linux installers, that is, extracting a SquashFS file. However, nuts does not handle in any way locale configuration, user creation, user management (including updating user settings, i.e., updating Latte Dock, Plasma, or ZSH configuration files), or partition configuration (such as modifying /etc/fstab), etc.
• Solely a backup utility.
  • nuts is not designed exclusively as a backup utility in the way that other utilities like restic, bup or filesystem-level tools like xfsdump and xfsrestore, btrfs-snapshot or lvmcreate were. To backup user data in Nitrux use Kup.
• A container, virtual machine, Live USB creator, Linux distribution, desktop environment, or "proprietary software."
  • Note: We don't know why anyone would think that, but one can never know, so let's clarify that.

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Requirements

• Nitrux 2.8.0+.

♦ Information: The utility will work out of the box starting with the mentioned release; however, the update files can set a minimum version.

• An active Internet connection.

⚠️ Important: The update process requires mandatory active internet connectivity via wired or wireless connections. Please connect to a functional network before starting the installer. Additionally, your computer should be capable of reaching GitHub and the domain raw.githubusercontent.com.

• Depending on the update file size, up to 1 GB is available in the home and root partitions.

Misc. Information

The Nitrux Update Tool System (nuts) can technically work with previous releases that use an immutable root, such as Nitrux 2.6.0, 2.6.1, 2.7.0, and 2.7.1, as long as the partition labels match the specific values (NX_ROOT for the root partition and NX_HOME for the home partition which is standard since Nitrux 2.8.0).

To see the partition label run the command blkid.

How to go nuts on Previous Releases

For releases of Nitrux where nuts is not available by default, do the following.

git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/Nitrux/nuts.git $HOME/nuts
sudo cp $HOME/nuts/usr/bin/nuts /usr/bin
sudo cp $HOME/nuts/etc/nuts.conf /etc

Usage

nuts is designed to be highly autonomous.

♦ Information: The use of this utility requires sudo

Commands:

Update: nuts update

• Updates the currently installed root using the specified archive in nuts-query and backs up the current root directory and partition.

Restore: nuts restore

• Restores the backup of the root directory generated during the update.

Rescue: nuts rescue

• Restores the backup of the XFS root partition in case of an interrupted update.

♦ Information: This operation is a special handling of an unforeseen event. If the update process were interrupted, the root would be inconsistent. That means the root is unusable, i.e., the user can't access the GUI or, worse, a TTY, so the user can't restore the SquashFS. This operation will allow the user to restore the root partition from a Live session. This operation does not replace restore; it exists if using restore is impossible. The user can only use this operation from a Live session.

Self-update: nuts self-update

• Updates nuts and its configuration file using the default branch set in the configuration file.

Configuration:

nuts uses the file /etc/nuts.conf to load some settings.

Options:

nuts -h or --help: Show this help.
nuts -v or --version: Show the version.
nuts -d or --debug: Enable verbose output.
nuts --use-main-branch: Defines the main branch of the Nitrux Update Tool System to download its components.
nuts --use-development-branch: Defines the development branch of the Nitrux Update Tool System to download its components.
nuts --keep-backups-on-update: Defines whether the Nitrux Update Tool System deletes backups during the update process.

Licensing

The repository and its contents are licensed under BSD-3-Clause.

Issues

If any problems are encountered, users can create an issue.

©2023 Nitrux Latinoamericana S.C.